Consider details such as these: GE is heavily investing in repairs. It purchased Austin Digital to accelerate how it can analyze data and provide diagnostics. GE can be fairly cautious about how it introduces new offerings and understandably protects its intellectual property, so the aftermarket becomes critical—as do lifecycle costs.

McElhinney told me GE needs to focus on lowering maintenance costs and increasing on-wing time for customers. This is not a new focus--he was emphasizing you have to do BOTH.

Given that GE’s in-service fleet will jump from 29,000 engines today to 45,900 in 2020, GE has to focus.